Ok, so I jumped on the bandwagon and read The Hunger Games. Honestly, part of what encouraged me to read it was an e-mail passed to me comparing this book about "cannibalism" (hardly) to Harry Potter, Twilight, and all the other books corrupting the youth out there. [I agree about Twilight; I think Harry Potter is ok for more mature audiences, not for the little kids it targets.] Something deep inside my book-worm heart (or 5 aortic arches?) rebels when I hear books grouped too readily by well-meaning conservatives into a banned book list. Too often, the good goes out with the bad because of a lack of understanding of the value (and even the necessity) of some violence and evil within literature.
Without going into a whole defense of the matter, I will give you the following quotation by Flannery O'Connor (a Catholic and a master of the appropriate use of the grotesque within fiction) to consider:
"The serious writer has always taken the flaw in human nature for his starting point, usually the flaw in an otherwise admirable character. Drama usually bases itself on the bedrock of original sin, whether the writer thinks in theological terms or not. Then, too, any character in a serious novel is supposed to carry a burden of meaning larger than himself. The novelist doesn't write about people in a vacuum; he writes about people in a world where something is obviously lacking, where there is the general mystery of incompleteness and the particular tragedy of our own times to be demonstrated, and the novelist tries to give you, within the form of the book, the total experience of human nature at any time. For this reason, the greatest dramas naturally involve the salvation or loss of the soul. Where there is no belief in the soul, there is very little drama. "
[And it is this element, a belief in the soul and the value of protecting it that helps redeem Harry Potter from the dredges of magician lore and irresponsible authority figures and that condemns Twilight to the dim reaches of literature that pretends morality by keeping certain limitations while glorifying all that is inhuman and anti-communal and much that is unchaste.]
So, a brief look at The Hunger Games from a literary and moral perspective . . . [It is certainly entertaining, I won't seek to address that side of things.]
The Good
- Thematically, I appreciated the relevant, dystopic focus on the objectification of man within reality entertainment, the inauthenticity of media presentation and bodily modification, the importance of human life (and burial rites as a way of showing reverence for human dignity), the value of self-sacrifice, the danger of totalitarian control over natural resources and economics, etc.
- Artistically, I liked the sub-cultures within the various Districts complete with their own landscape, way of adaptation to the Capital's control, economic specialties, local customs, and types of bread. Interestingly, this element also, like the Houses in Harry Potter, makes millions for those who churn out fan-material connected to the books and movies as each reader chooses his or her favorite Tribute and District and buys posters and memorabilia associated with that "team." I'll remember this effective marketing element if I ever start writing pop-fiction for obsessive teens.
- I thought some of the imagery was good and helped the reader visualize the story well. You could see how easy it would be to translate it to film (which I have not seen yet) and satisfy the fans of the book since there isn't a ton of lee-way for imaginative license [though, apparently some very silly readers imagined "dark skin" in District 11 to mean something other than "black" and became riled up over the casting in the movie.]
- The manipulative tone of the Gamekeepers was consistent throughout. One was never tempted to glorify them or praise them for their ingenuity since their disregard for human life was so obvious. It would have been a lesser book had the opposite been true.
- There is no sexuality (except for a mention that sometimes the female Tributes were practically naked when first presented to the crowds) and Katniss is personally very modest (keeps well-covered and doesn't want to strip Peeta when he's injured, etc.). There's lots of kissing, but no real description there, and it's made Platonic and almost repulsive by Katniss' mental analysis of how she is using her affection for Peeta to win over the audience.
- The violence is there but remains verbally distant. Collins doesn't even get close to approaching the level of violent description of Homer's Iliad, never mind some of the gruesome modern novels people read. She allows the reader to be imaginative to his own tolerance level, but she does not glory in the details herself. I have no idea how they have portrayed the first day's "blood bath" or Cato's brutal death from the mutant wolves in the movie, but in the books, all of that happens out of the main character's view and thus out of the reader's as well.
- Katniss needed to stop thinking so much. As an over-analyzer myself, it is not an attractive quality in a character. Tolkien's Aragorn never had to remind himself of his family problems and conflicted emotions every single time he acted. Tolkien's reader is expected to remember the back-stories and assume that they were formative to his characters. Collins didn't seem to want to have that much faith in her readers. (Don't believe me? Start counting how many times Katniss mentions Gale when she thinks of Peeta or how many times she mentions her dad's love of music or her mom's "checked out" period after his death. The girl doesn't let anything go!) The rule in fiction is "SHOW don't TELL" what a character is feeling and thinking . . . Collins forgot this rule.
- Katniss understands that sexuality (or at least romance in her case) can be used to play upon the audience's emotions, but I think she is naive in thinking that she can play that sort of a role and not be affected. She doesn't seem to catch on that what she does with her body affects her mind/soul. Similarly, she doesn't catch on until really really far along that Peeta is authentic in his affection for her. Then, she doesn't have the honesty or self-knowledge to tell him that she's still just using their romance as a survival technique . . . maybe. Character internal conflict is good in a novel, but her conflict remains mostly unresolved at the end, which is lame and provides a cheap trick to transition to a sequel.
- Linked to this is the idea that Katniss borrows from Peeta that she wants to preserve something of her humanity while she alternates between killing and running from her fellow Tributes. Great idea and well executed in Rue's burial. It's also somewhat apparent in her sacrificial alliance with Peeta when he's wounded and a little less apparently in her "mercy killing" of Cato. By the time she confesses to Peeta that she's been using him the whole time to get crowd approval, it's hard to believe that the games have not changed her. They have at the very least convinced her that "everyone can lie" when needed--so keep your humanity and individuality by playing a double game in order to screw over the government with your deceit . . . and possibly use your friend too. Good message?
- If you're going to use names with cultural references (Cato, Hawthorne, Caesar, Cinna, Plutarch, & Portia) there should be a connection to the historical personality or position. Otherwise, your only message is, "Old names sound cool but this dystopian society (or I as an author) have totally lost track of their significance." Speaking of, everyone makes a big deal out of Collins being inspired by the story of Theseus but I have yet to see (personally or in any published commentary) what the link could possibly be. Theseus kills big strong things and so does Katniss?
- Katniss is just a weak character. Just as she doesn't fit a "box" when Haymitch tries to find an image for her to project at the opening interviews, she never seems to quite know herself or to be known by anyone (except perhaps Gale). She's fiercely loyal to young, innocent girls and conflicted at best in her relationship with everyone else. She comes across as fierce or air-headed at various points depending on how the crowd wants to see her or how much she enjoyed her last kiss. You could see her as a budding adolescent who has trained herself in cynicism and stoicism but is realizing that emotion will assert itself despite her best efforts. But as a Bildungsroman, the book fails to bring her to a point of greater maturity, just greater conflict. Perhaps I'm not being fair since I have not read the whole series. Maybe The Hunger Games was never meant to stand alone. However, since her survival of the Hunger Games themselves was never really a point of suspense (you can't just kill off the main character in first book of a three book series), I was hoping that character development would fill out the trajectory of the plot line, and it didn't.
- All the other characters are flat. There is no development at all in any of them. I expect this treatment of minor characters in pre-Rennaisance or even pre-Romantic Era fiction where "types" or "stock characters" were seen as universal elements meant to compliment the protagonist but not distract from his or her action. But, in modern fiction, which often claims to delight in psychological awareness or realistic detail, it looks like authorial laziness.
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